Whew boy… To start with, if you’re easily offended, please… Maybe just sit this one out. I’ve tried to avoid some of the more adult oriented films out there for a while, but we were always going to have to cross this line eventually. Now’s the time.

SO… The first thing we need to address with this film is the damn title. Masked Avenger Versus Ultra-Villain In The Lair of the Naked Bikini. Makes absolutely no sense. What the hell is a ‘Naked Bikini,’ and how would it have a lair? Never mind the fact that our masked hero isn’t avenging anyone, and our bad guy is never referred to as “Ultra-Villain.” He’s definitely a villain, I’ll give them that, but he’s really not all that ultra. Pretty much, he’s just a balding German dude who really wants to impregnate a virgin. Believe me, folks, theres nothing special about that. Luckily, we can clear up this confusing mess rather quickly; Masked Avenger Versus Ultra-Villain In The Lair of the Naked Bikini is not the film’s original title. This movie was originally supposed to be called (drum roll) The Masturbating Gunman. Yep. Now, obviously, not a whole lot of distributors are going to want to touch a movie with a title like that, so at some point, we wind up getting the name of the picture swapped for something more commercial that doesn’t actually have anything to do with the movie itself. It is unfortunate on many levels that in actuality, the original title would have been much more appropriate. Yeah….

THE PLOT: All across Australia, criminals know to fear the name “The Masturbating Gunman” above all else… A cunning and relentless detective with the physical strength of a gladiator and the nose of a ravenous blood hound, The Masturbating Gunman is a formidable combatant, and if you should find yourself on the wrong side of the law, he will stop at nothing until he brings you to justice… That is, unless he finds himself even the slightest bit sexually aroused, at which point he will fall to the ground and masturbate frantically for several minutes until.. Well, until he’s finished. It’s super gross, and it happens several times in the movie. Why nobody ever manages to blow his head off while he’s just going to town on himself is never adequately explained, but I guess the universe helps those who help themselves.

Anyway. So, that’s our main dude. Our villain, however, is just some evil, balding German dude, which, honestly, is just the very definition of generic. Guess it was slim pickin’s at the super-villain outlet store or something. Try harder, you guys. Anyway. Early on, our “Ultra-Villain” is released from prison, and because birds gotta fly, bee’s gotta sting, and Germans gotta conquer the Earth, he immediately launches his latest and greatest diabolical scheme- and it’s a doozy. Not really, he just wants to impregnate a virgin because he thinks that the birth of his son will usher in a new age for humanity or some such shit. Pretty boiler plate. Sadly, this is already a new age for humanity, and a lot has changed since our man got his tuckus tossed in the clink. For one thing, virgins are a hell of a lot harder to come by.

Hoping for the best against all odds, Ultra-Villain sends his goons out to retrieve the future mother of his offspring, and try as thry might, they keep coming up empty handed, much to his teutonic chagrin. Finally, somebody has the brilliant idea to run out and nab a nun, figuring that’s damn near a sure thing, so far as virgin-napping is concerned. This plan seems pretty solid at first, and they actually manage to successfully capture a nun without much fuss, but in a most inopportune coincidence, the nun they grab just so happens to be the sister of… The damn Masturbating Gunman. Rut roh, Rhaggy! Logically, a confrontation between the good guy and the bad guy is now inevitable, and that’s the movie.

So, clearly, this is a weird one. For those of you with more puritanical sensibilities, you’re probably better off obeying your instincts and steering clear, but it is worth mentioning that this is a comedy, with relatively scant nudity. Masked Avenger Versus Ultra-Villain In The Lair Of The Naked Bikini isn’t ever really trying to be sexy, the adult content is always played for laughs, and never to titillate. It gets pretty gross, but it doesn’t really ever feel smutty, more just super, duper crude. If you regularly watch South Park, then odds are you’ve been through worse than this already.

It’s also really, really low budget, and quite poorly made. The soundtrack is all cheap, horrible synth muzak, the sort that the British Commonwealth seems to be immune to, but which all Americans fear like kryptonite. It’s shot on video, and the photography is amateurish, to say the least. The audio throughout is uneven, and sometimes quite poor, and all of the action sequences require a lot of forgiveness, and more than a little imagination to follow. You’ll be surprised that this thing was released in the year 2000. Even with all of that already factored in, probably the single worst thing the film has working against it is how agonizingly drawn out everything is. Sequences drag on slower than a newborn turtle dragging an anchor across a freeway, and you could probably cut everything down to a crisp 45 minutes without losing any real content, if you really wanted to.

For some reason, however, I’m hesitant to look these many issues and count them as a mark against the quality of the picture, which seems weird. In watching MAVUBITLOFNB (to save time), one get’s the sneaking suspicion that the director is fucking with us. It’s just so at peace with how badly it sucks… I just can’t shake the notion that for some reason, this is exactly the movie Savage wanted to make. Maybe I’m wrong, but it certainly seems to fit with the film’s sense of humor, and there is enough wit evident throughout the movie to suggest that the intellect behind this whole thing wouldn’t make some of these puzzling decisions without adequate deliberation. Mark Savage isn’t stupid enough to suck this badly. He’s punking us, you guys. Every time I watch it, I feel like there’s someone hiding behind a curtain and laughing their ass off at the frustrated expression on my face like it’s just freaking hysterical.

And actually, the film IS pretty funny! MAVUTITLOTNB is horribly crude, overly long, and badly crafted, but I’ve willingly sat through it a handful of times, and I’m happy that I own a copy. This movie sucks… and that’s… awesome? This paradox will destroy me if I think about it any longer, so with that, I conclude this review.

Actually, one more thing before I go; why in the hell does the main character’s “super hero” costume look almost exactly like the outfits worn by the bad guy’s henchmen? Seriously, that would be like if Luke Skywalker was indistinguishable from a Storm trooper. They both wear big, loose, blue jumpsuits and black face masks. This can’t have been an accident. It’s totally bizarre. Why would anyone do this!? I really can’t wrap my mind around it. Okay, I seriously better back off now. I can hear the sound of my sanity starting to crack under the weight of this movie’s nonsensical girth.